NOGALES, Arizona —The massive border wall demanded by President Donald Trump was completed today, spanning the United States’ entire 2,000 mile southern border with an impenetrable defense against the disease, filth and criminality brought by immigrants.

Twenty feet high, made of reinforced concrete topped with gleaming spikes, it represents a stupendous achievement both in the speed in which it was built — less than two years since the president took office — and for its financing: the entire $42 billion dollar cost borne by the nation of Mexico.

“We defer to the inexorable will of President Donald Trump,” said Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, signing a check for the final payment. “This should help our neighbor to the north remain unviolated by illegal entry of the criminals and rapists that Mexico creates in such profusion.”

The governor of Arizona, Doug Ducey, wielded a trowel and tapped in the final, ceremonial gold-plated brick, then declared a statewide Day of Jubilee to mark the occasion, giving governmental workers a paid vacation to “enjoy their families, now free from the threat of being murdered by invasive hordes of Guatemalan refugees” and praised the clear eye and firm hand of Trump for bringing about this …

*****

There, that should do it. Trump is famous for his brief attention span. By now he’ll have looked up, beaming, and been distracted by a shiny object. Clip the above and send it to the White House, congratulating Trump on his stunning success. Or, better, tweet it to him. Problem solved.

Needless to say, the first four paragraphs of this column, above the break, are an utter fabrication. They are not true. A lie that I made up for my own rhetorical purposes. A lot of that going around. The wall has not been built and never will be. While I generally believe that satire doesn’t belong in a daily newspaper, because of the risk of confusion, these are extraordinary times, with the government shutdown entering its 13th day Friday with no end in sight. They demand extraordinary measures. Why go through further expense, conflict and suffering? The simple solution is for Trump to just declare the wall a reality and his duped followers will believe him.

Trump gave me the idea himself, in a tweet Wednesday: “Mexico is paying for the Wall through the new USMCA Trade Deal. Much of the Wall has already been fully renovated or built.”

That is nonsense. Is it a lie that Trump knowingly says in the hope others will believe him? Or a sincere delusion of his? Doesn’t matter. We can solve this by Trump cynically announcing the wall is there. Or, if need be, he can be convinced with lies of our own, a simple task, considering the insane right wing propaganda he parrots verbatim. Do we need a white nationalist hate site to tell him the wall exists? Or will ordinary citizens suffice?

While the media takes careful note of the president’s lies, it seldom imitates him. Which puts us at a disadvantage. Why should we be consigned to tilling to the narrow, dry field of fact while the president wanders freely in the luxuriant groves of fantasy, stuffing himself on the fruit of folly?

There will never be a wall. A dozen reasons why. Start with the Rio Grande, which forms the border between Texas and Mexico. The wall would have to be on the American side, on land seized from ranchers, cutting off their access to the river. Imagine how well that would work.

The key point is: we don’t need a wall. What we need are immigrants and a functioning legal system to absorb them into this country.

Whoops, space dwindles. Sometimes readers will read the top of a column, then jump to the end. Mustn’t disappoint them.

The Department of the Treasury announced creation of a commemorative $500 bill with Trump’s portrait on it, honoring what is already being called Trump’s Wall, pictured on the back of the bill.

“The law actually forbids a living person from appearing on currency,” said treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin. “But laws are nothing compared to the celestial grandeur of our supreme leader, Donald Trump, whose wise stewardship has taken our nation so far toward recovering the greatness we lost along the way. This new bill will honor that achievement.”